confessions of a music snob

If I get 30 seconds into a song and the lyrics are poorly written -- I'm skipping it, most of the time.

See, I LOVE music. I grew up in a pretty musical family. My musical filter has nothing to do with style or genre but has everything to do with whether I see effort or artistic merit in how the song was created. I can't help it. I promise it's not at pretentious as it sounds. I just love good music so much.

So I end up listening to sad slow acoustics like Penny & Sparrow and smiling from ear to ear. (If you haven't heard of Penny & Sparrow, it's time.)

But....there are some days where you do want to just come home from a long day, throw on the biggest t-shirt you own and throw on Christ Brown's "Forever" and hit shuffle.

(This was exactly what I did.)

I felt like dancing. A few throwback songs later and I was having a full on concert that I probably should have charged my neighbors for.

LADIES, let me tell you something. People you love can hurt you, sure, I don't put glitter in my cereal in the morning.

But, love shouldn't hurt.

The love you are in should not be painful.

If you are measuring the reality of your love based on the amount of emotions you are feeling, you are fooling yourself.

You want to know how you can know if it's real?

If it's patient.

If it's kind.

If it does not envy or boast.

If it isn't arrogant or rude.

If it isn't guilty or leave you feeling dirty.

If it isn't irritable or resentful.

If it rejoices in the truth.

If it encourages where you are gifted.

If it bears ALL of the burdens, and not just when things are good.

If it hopes all things.

If it endures all things.

If it's rooted in the foundational and everlasting love of Christ.

If it hurts? How did we get SO off track?

This idea is the reason why we get so stuck believing in fake plastic love that looks like dark messy rooms, tears down our cheeks and thrown expletives like confetti.

I feel like we have been conditioned to believe that love is not pure. Because maybe we've never seen or experienced it.

“It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”

- CS Lewis

I believe we can be far too easily pleased with the place we feel comfortable in.

Think of one person in the Bible that was comfortable. I'm trying to think of one....let me know.

I kind of went off on a tangent there, but I think they are infinitely related. Who we love and how we live our life.

We will absolutely never ever follow the Lord to the fullest extent if we are in toxic relationships, or even stagnant ones.

Who we live our lives with immediately correlates to how we follow God. Follow and be with people who are going the direction you want to go.

So yes, I'm a music snob.

Because I like cool well-written lyrics that speak to hearts like mine and I'm not a huge fan of dumb advice.